Improve your golf swing with these 2 tips

David Banks
Authored by David Banks
Posted Friday, April 10, 2020 - 9:31pm

Golf can be an incredibly rewarding sport. It also can be one of the most frustrating sports. It's amazing how you can get to the point in a round where you convince yourself you are never golfing again. Then on the next shot, your swing is buttery smooth, the contact is clean with an amazingly pure sound, and you land the ball within a few yards of the pin from 170 yards out. In an instant you forget every terrible shot leading up to that one, extremely gratifying shot.

Unfortunately, for most golfers those moments of gratification after a good shot are few and far between. They spend most of the round frustrated. But this doesn't have to be you. There is absolutely a formula you can follow that will all but guarantee you hitting better, cleaner shots more consistently. What's this magic formula? It's easy. Practice and record yourself.

I know, I know. Practice. Real ground-breaking stuff here. That's the answer to getting better at anything, isn't it? Not necessarily. If you practice incorrectly, you will only instill more and more in your head how to do whatever it is you are practicing incorrectly. Correct, consistent practice is how you get better at anything. And golf is no different. But golf is much more fun to practice than just about everything else. In this article I will lay out exactly how to practice and how often. In other words, you will get the exact formula to follow to significantly improve your golf swing. You can also check out this article for more ideas: https://www.golftreasury.com/how-to-swing-a-golf-club.

Get to the Golf Range

Getting out on the golf range is such a great way to practice your golf swing, as long as it is done consistently and correctly. Get to the range once a week. You can easily get through a bucket of balls in 30 minutes or less, and that's plenty. Find a golf range that is on your way home from work (or some other place you visit at least weekly). See if that golf range has some sort of season pass or punch card for the range. Then choose a time and day that you will visit the range and put it on your calendar. The same day and same time every week.

You also need to make sure you are dedicating the same amount of time practicing with each club. Generally, use only one or two clubs per trip. If you are going to practice two different clubs, make sure they are similar, and preferably consecutive, e.g. 8-iron and 9-iron. And make sure you cycle through all of your clubs equally in your practice sessions. Don't skip any. This is how you are going to develop the muscle memory and feel in your brain for how to hit each club in your bag.

Record Your Swing

Advances in technology have put an HD camera in virtually everybody's pocket via their cell phone. Take advantage of this! Ideally you record every swing you take, both at the driving range as well as on the golf course. Set up your phone against your bag at the range and record every golf swing. If you're playing a round, try to get one of the members in your group to record every swing you take. Then watch over, review and analyze your swing at the end of every session.

Watching your swing on tape will give you more insights into your swing and tendencies than anything else. You will be able to spot bad habits you may have developed. You'll gain encouragement by noticing things you are doing correctly. And you will always find something you can work on to improve. After each swing, be sure to add a sentence or two of commentary stating how the shot ended up, whether there was a slice or a draw, etc. This way you can pick apart exactly what you did to create that result, and then fix it.

There are some pretty cool cell phone holders that attach to the bars of the golf cart. You can instantly turn any golf cart into a golf cart with built in GPS. More importantly, you can also use them as a camera stand. Many sit on swivels that you can quickly and easily rotate to make sure your next shot will be in view. This way you don't have to ask somebody else to record your swing and you don't have to keep taking your phone out and putting it away.

Wrap-up

Getting to the point where you hit better, cleaner shots more consistently really is not that difficult. All you have to do is practice. At 30 minutes a week at the driving range to your routine and you will become a more consistent ball striker, guaranteed. Then when you analyze your swing (because you recorded every swing when possible) on video, you will be able to pick small improvements to make, one at a time. These small changes will also result in better, more consistent golf play.

Many of you may believe I haven't discussed anything in this article that is ground-breaking or revolutionary. While I agree, I can tell you that if you get to the range every week and record & diagnose your swing as often as possible, the change in your golf game will absolutely be revolutionary! So get to the range, regularly and consistently, and be prepared to be amazed at the improvement.

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